Morning Prayer
The
period of thanksgiving (after Mass in the morning)
Father Charles invariably spent between the choir sacristy and the flight
of stone steps leading to the organ-loft. That it was long I know, that
it was fervent we need I think have no doubt. Why he chose those two
places I have mentioned may be for two reasons.
First,
the unlikelihood of being disturbed there; and secondly because they
were both cold and uncomfortable - extremely so in the Winter, since
they were devoid of any means whatsover of heating. If ordinarily he
was on fire with the love of God, and there was every indication that
this was his normal state, his heart must have been a veritable furnace
after Mass. Nothing else can account for the fact that even on the coldest
days of Winter he would throw open the window and remain long in front
of it bareheaded and without protection of the mantle worn by us outside
of the Summertime. I remember going to him for some reason or other
on a few occasions during his thanksgiving. Once or twice he was sitting
on a faldstool opposite the open window through which blew an icy breeze
from the snow covered fields and hills around. The other occasions,
with face buried in his hands, he leaned on the window-sill, immovable.
Whenever
possible night or day he paid visits to the Blessed Sacrament. Of what
passed between him and The Master in those heart to heart talks we may
and judge from the, fervour of his life only, since during them he made
himself as invisible to human eye as his ingenuity could devise. His
favourite place in the daytime was the organ loft, which is reached
without leaving the monastery or going through the Church, where a crowd
was always sure to gather round him. He was undisturbed in the organ
loft and reckoned he was also unobserved.
Contents
Saint Charles
and
Nature
Passion
of Jesus
Prayer
Service